


tread heavily around me (the ever-after remix)

by antikytheras



Category: Pocket Monsters: Sword & Shield | Pokemon Sword & Shield Versions
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Established Relationship, Growing Up, M/M, OR IS HE, Sequel Remix, in which i attempt to practice writing plot, keyword: Attempt, kind of, something something raihan is part dragon, very light angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-08
Updated: 2020-02-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 01:40:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22615750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antikytheras/pseuds/antikytheras
Summary: They say the king has sold his soul to a dragon, that the fearsome man by his side is his accursed gift from the great old gods.(they’re only half right in all the wrong ways.)
Relationships: Dande | Leon/Kibana | Raihan
Comments: 10
Kudos: 157





	tread heavily around me (the ever-after remix)

**Author's Note:**

Leon steps through the thickets of the forest carefully—the last time he’d taken this shortcut, he’d left via the express route down the wrong side of a cliff with a delirious, newly-winged part-dragon clinging to him like a lifeline, and he didn’t particularly feel like going for another round without aforementioned part-dragon by his side, thank you very much.

Soon enough, light begins streaming through the thinning canopy, and Leon runs towards the end of the forest. The earth turns to stone beneath his pounding feet, and the trees grow sparser and sparser until he arrives at one of the many cliffs surrounding his domain.

This time, it’s Raihan standing at the edge of a thousand-foot drop with his back to Leon. The wind sends ripples through the leathery web of his wings. It’s only been a month, but his wingspan is already wider than any Leon’s ever seen, and he knows (from unfortunate first-hand experience) that the appendages have long grown strong and sturdy enough to knock a grown man off his feet.

Raihan looks back over his shoulder. ‘Took you long enough.’

‘Sorry, I got lost,’ Leon admits sheepishly.

Raihan turns back to stare down the cliff again. ‘I suppose that means you’re better at fulfilling your royal duties than you are at directions?’

‘Hey!’ Leon bristles. ‘I showed up for that meeting at eight in the morning today!’

The faint amusement in Raihan’s voice carries well over the wind. ‘So you did.’

Leon stares at his back. Ever since his wings finally sprouted, Raihan’s seemed so much taller, so much more sure of himself. The wings had grown on him, yes, but he’d grown into his wings beautifully too. Their weight hardly seems to matter to him. If anything, the huge, heavy things put a new spring in his step.

Those things might be anti-gravity devices for Raihan, but Leon knows better than to assume they won’t get _him_ forcibly acquainted with gravity again. ‘I’m coming up behind you,’ he warns, cautiously inching closer to Raihan’s side.

Raihan folds his massive wings around him with the same grace and ease he’d use to throw on a cape. They wrap around him perfectly, like a well-tailored coat. It’s a neat little trick he’d figured out after the fifth time he’d turned too quickly and clocked Leon over the head, sending him spiralling to the ground.

(His royal advisors had been _horrified_ , but Leon had gone down giggling.)

Leon looks over the edge of the cliff for a second, then resolves to keep his gaze above the ground and his thoughts firmly _away_ from anything involving those wings and getting knocked off his feet.

The part-dragon steps back from the edge and turns to face Leon with a lazy smile. ‘What, you don’t trust me?’

‘Of course I do.’ Leon snorts. It’s remarkably un-princely behaviour. ‘I’d just prefer to keep my cliff-jumping to less than once a month, thank you very much. Actually, once in a _lifetime_ is more than enough.’

Raihan laughs. ‘Well, if you fall, I’ll just have to catch you.’

_The night of their fall, Leon had been beside himself with worry._

_Raihan had been burning up, his breathing laboured and his eyes closed and unmoving. Leon clutched him tightly as he ran into through the streets, ignoring the inquisitive, worried stares and horrified gasps of his people around him._

_When he’d burst into the infirmary, the royal medics only looked up from their reports before calmly filing to their places. Leon put the part-dragon onto a bed, as he’d been directed, and then they’d whisked the curtains shut and there was only the clinking of tools and sharp, precise bursts of communication._

_‘We’ll take care of him,’ the head medic assured. ‘But first, we’d like to check you for injuries.’_

_‘I’m fine,’ Leon had insisted._

_The head medic raised an eyebrow, making a show of slowly tracing his eyes down Leon’s body._

_He looked down. There was blood. So much blood._

_His heart dropped into the pit of his stomach. ‘It’s not mine,’ he mumbled hollowly._

_‘It’s just good to make sure,’ the head medic said kindly. ‘Besides, you can stay the night with your friend.’_

_There was a horrible, shuddering gasp from beyond the curtain, and Leon sprinted three steps toward it before he could even register what his body was doing._

_With a firm grasp on the back of Leon’s cape, the head medic hummed thoughtfully. ‘On second thought, maybe you_ are _fit for discharge after all.’_

Once they’re a reasonable distance away from any devious, no-good cliff edges, Raihan unfolds his wings and reaches for Leon’s hand.

Leon looks down at their intertwined fingers. The scales that had once been nothing more than a smattering of stars across Raihan’s wrist now inch, day by day, toward the back of his hand. It’s sheer curiosity that drives Leon to rub a finger over the small, new scales, and he’s pleasantly surprised to hear the pleased sound that escapes Raihan’s lips.

‘Lower, right there— _oh yeah, that’s the spot_ —’

‘Are you a cat?’ Leon asks, amused.

He’s surprised to see the irritation that flickers in Raihan’s eyes. ‘No.’

Leon bites the inside of his cheek and curses himself. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean—’

‘No, it’s alright.’ The tension leaves Raihan’s shoulders, and he squeezes his hand. ‘I know you don’t mean anything by it.’

_He’d never seen Raihan like this._

_‘Unhand me,’ Raihan demanded, fighting against his restraints with more strength than Leon had ever known he’d had._

_‘Rai—’_

_There was a terrifyingly loud crack as one of his wings escaped the bindings wrapped around his chest. ‘I will_ not _be chained and prodded and_ experimented on _like some exotic_ pet _—’_

_‘You’re not—’_

_‘Then unbind me!’ Raihan snarled, anger and fear and something older than time itself etched into the haggard lines of his face._

_In unthinking awe, Leon found himself with no choice but to comply._

Leon hums at Raihan’s response. ‘No, you’re right. I shouldn’t have said that.’

Raihan falls silent, and Leon finds solace in the words that are left unsaid. They continue strolling towards the forest, Leon pressed to Raihan’s side and Raihan’s wing held over him to shelter them both from the buffeting winds.

_Raihan cradled his head in his hands. Leon’s heart ached to see him curled up, so small, so afraid, so unlike his usual strong self._

_‘I don’t know what’s happening to me,’ Raihan confessed. ‘I’ve never seen any of the others act like this. They just grow scales, and wings, and that’s it, they go on with life, but I—’_

_Leon tilted his head. ‘What are you talking about?’_

_Raihan swallowed. ‘It feels like there’s something inside my head—’_

_‘But you’re still_ you _, aren’t you?’_

_Raihan looked up, and Leon saw his own silly grin reflected in his wide, shocked, so-very-human eyes._

The walk back through the forest is much shorter now that Raihan’s there to make sure Leon doesn’t get _too_ lost.

‘The next one’s a right, right?’

Raihan laughs. ‘At this point, I think going _against_ your gut might make for better life choices.’

Leon starts to protest, but then Raihan’s distracting him exceedingly well with kisses and sweet platitudes, and the protests grudgingly evaporate into thin air.

They take the left fork in the road, and just like that, Leon’s mountainous kingdom looms in the near distance. Things are so simple and easy when Raihan’s around, he thinks happily.

Raihan stretches out the cricks in his neck and spreads his wings out wide. ‘Well, I guess this is it?’ He starts to withdraw his hand from their intertwined grip, but Leon grabs tight and doesn’t let go.

‘Come back with me,’ he says quietly.

Raihan’s wing twitches. ‘I don’t belong there.’

‘Yes, you do,’ Leon insists. ‘Just come visit, even if it’s just for a little while. My mum wants to make you some scones.’

Raihan raises one eyebrow. ‘The Queen is inviting me to tea, you say?’

Leon’s surprised that he’s playing along, but he refuses to let himself be caught off guard, so instead he stubbornly forges on ahead. ‘Yes, and it would be awful rude of you to refuse a royal invitation, wouldn’t it?’

Raihan entertains the thought. ‘Well, if it’s Her Royal Majesty…’

‘Then it’s decided!’ Leon claps his hands together gleefully. ‘You’re coming to the big gala tonight!’

‘Wait, what—’

‘Oh man, I can’t wait to tell Hop and Mum!’

Raihan wrenches his hand free and grabs his shoulder. His fingers are really digging into Leon’s collarbones, ow— ‘Leon, no, this is a really bad idea—’

‘And why’s that?’ Leon challenges.

Raihan has never been one to back down easily, and he’s certainly not about to start now. ‘You can’t seriously think it’s a good idea to parade _me_ in front of emissaries from _every country_.’

‘Why?’ Leon repeats, shrugging Raihan’s hand off.

Raihan won’t meet his eyes. His tells have always been obvious to Leon. ‘I don’t want to be there.’

‘Stop lying. Look me in the eye and answer me.’

When Raihan drags his gaze to meet Leon’s, it’s with a strange, almost otherworldly effort.

‘You know what they’re gonna say,’ Raihan says quietly, then he averts his gaze to the forest floor again.

Heart pounding thunderously in his chest, Leon grabs him by the front of his shirt. The shock (and, for an even more fleeting moment— there’s that strange, proud, dismissive look again, and there’s a fire burning in response in the pit of his own stomach, but just-like-that it’s gone and the moment passes) flashes bright-hot in Raihan’s eyes, and for a second, Leon’s fully expecting him to lash back out at him.

So before Raihan can so much as exhale, Leon yells, ‘And why do I have to care what they say? Why can’t I be with the person I love?’

Raihan’s voice is rough, but his grasp is gentle when he pries Leon’s hands off him. ‘You’re going to be king, Leon.’

‘So?’ he demands. There’s a pregnant silence, until Raihan says, plain and simple—

‘So, you can’t be seen with an abomination like me.’

‘You think you’re an abomination?’

Raihan snorts. ‘No, course not. But they do, and your kingdom depends on you being all buddy-buddy with them.’

‘ _My_ kingdom is not that weak,’ Leon snaps, and Raihan’s giving him a strange side-eye again. It’s going to take Leon time to get used to some of Raihan’s new developments, but until then, that strangeness inside Raihan had better get used to butting heads. ‘I _will_ be king, and they _will_ obey the laws of _my_ land while they breathe its air.’

The strangeness in Raihan’s eyes contemplates his words. ‘I see,’ he says evenly, straightening his rumpled shirt collar. ‘Are you sure you’re ready?’

‘Are _you_?’ Leon challenges, and the tension finally spills over and smothers the heat of their arrogance-and-stubbornness.

Raihan smiles, and the strangeness in his eyes warms like coals in a hearth. Leon doesn’t dwell too hard on the strange, impossible centuries-old certainty in Raihan’s words when he comments, ‘You know, I actually think you’d make a fairly good king.’

_Raihan sounded like he’d uttered his own death sentence. ‘I know what’s happening to me.’_

_Leon looked up from his extremely boring copy of the inter-regional accords. ‘Oh? That’s good to hear.’_

_Raihan had been leaning against the doorframe to Leon’s personal quarters, one hand wrapped tight around his opposite elbow. Leon noted the way his fingers dug into his skin, but he’d found himself far more worried about the deathly paleness suffusing his pallor._

_He seemed to be waiting for Leon to ask some dreaded question. Instead, Leon asked:_

_‘Are you okay?’_

_A nod._

_‘Are you dying?’_

_Raihan shook his head._

_‘Are you in pain?’_

_Raihan took a moment to think, but ultimately shook his head again._

_In the silence that followed, Leon steeled himself for the hardest question he could possibly ask his most trusted friend._

_Raihan closed his eyes, having long accepted the downward swing of whatever invisible blade loomed over his head._

_‘Do you still love me?’_

_Raihan’s eyes flew open. He’d been completely caught by surprise. ‘Huh?’_

_Leon’s heart sinks. ‘It’s okay, you don’t have to lie, I understand if you don’t love me any—’_

_‘What are you talking about, dumbass?’ Raihan sounded extremely annoyed, which, in Leon’s books, was a definite step-up from “extremely depressed”. ‘Of course I still love you.’_

_‘Oh.’ Leon’s heart floated back up to his chest cavity where it belonged, and he beamed sunnily at his best friend, now and always. ‘Then that’s enough for me.’_

_For a long, long moment, Raihan gawked at him wordlessly. Then he buried his face in his hands and, shoulders shaking with the weight of all the unshed tears, laughed so loud and so full that Leon’s heart could have burst out of sheer joy and relief._

Raihan’s appearance at the gala goes about as well as they’d all expected.

Leon had been seated on his crown prince’s throne, utterly bored out of his mind while he made polite noises at some trade ambassador’s attempts to curry favour with him.

Then, there had been a great flapping noise, and Raihan had descended from the parapets like a heavenly messenger, ethereal wings extended proudly for all to admire and worship.

His drop from mid-air to solid ground had been perfectly smooth. He’d landed on his toes (silent like a cat, Leon would think, except he doesn’t want to offend his boyfriend again) and wrapped his wings around himself neatly, not a single leathery fold out of place.

Then, he strides forward, and the sea of stunned diplomats parts before him. Raihan does not bow, does not drop to one knee or even so much as acknowledge the authority of Leon’s future crown.

Instead he looks up the short flight of steps to Leon’s throne and asks, politely, ‘I believe I was invited for tea?’

_Soon, word spreads throughout every kingdom on the land. Whispers of arcane magic, of curses and dark promises and ancient rituals, every forbidden spell in the unknown books— the rumours scatter like dust in the wind, each fragment more warped and more impossible than the one before._

_And still the foolish mortals whisper._

_They say that the future king of Galar has sold his soul to a dragon, that they’ve seen the great old god’s messenger whisper stygian secrets into the king’s listening ear. They say that the strange winged man has eyes like fire and a voice like basalt in the aftermath of a volcano. They say that the kingdom has never known anything but endless prosperity, that it has weathered every storm with unholy determination and every war with charismatic-and-kind ruthlessness._

_They say that the king loves the dragon, and that the dragon’s hoard has naught but the king in it. They say that the king built the dragon’s cave and the dragon guards the king’s castle. They say the king and dragon share two broken halves of the same sunless soul, and that because one cannot die, the other will never follow._

_(they’re only half-right in all the wrong ways.)_

**Author's Note:**

> come yell at me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/syorobao) or leave a comment because i need some kind of motivation to fuel my attempts at writing daily（；；）


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